Ubiquiti error...

RedvGreen

RedvGreen

RedvGreen

Soldato
Joined
2 Dec 2009
Posts
4,018
Location
Midlands
Until today I’ve been running a successful wireless network comprising:

1 x 8Port POE switch 60W (5-8 are POE)

With the following connected via cat6 POE:
1 x Cloudkey
2 x APAC LR

Now, today, I ran a Cat6 run from the Switch in the loft, outside the house, over the Sky Dish cable directly behind the dish, into the lower room downstairs, approx 15m.

Cable tested (basic) all passed.

Attached new AP AC LR and it it going mental.

It alternates between...
Connected (wireless uplink)
to
Isolated

I’ve swapped the cables at the switch and the existing APs work fine on port 8.

I’ve recrimped with new RJ45 and the same problem exists.

Ive yet to swap the APs around to test the cables, but there is clearly a problem. The switch indicates POE is active but no data is transferring - it will only adopt and connect wirelessly to a weak signal from the closest other AP.

Any ideas what the problem may be here? I don’t think the Sky cable will cause interference as both the cat6 and the Sky Cable will be shielded. I’m wondering if the sky dish itself is causing interference?

Also considering that the AP may be faulty too.
 
bremen1874 said:
They do look okay. It'd have been nice to get the jacket under the cable clamp, but that's not going to stop them working.

That isn't shielded cable, but it doesn't need to be. I would have used external grade cable if it's going outside.

Try connecting something else (laptop?) using the same cable run and see if that works.
Click to expand...

It did have a blue/silver foil around the full sets of twisted pairs and the annoying central ‘+’ core too. I always thought this was outdoor proof?!

I’ll patch the loft cable into the non-POE switch port and try a laptop as you say...
 
bremen1874 said:
Why use shielded cable with unshielded plugs? The shielding is supposed to connect the metal body of the plug and from there to the socket it's plugged into.

That appears to be PVC cable. If it is it'll degrade in sunlight (but it will take a while depending on where it's situated).

I'd have used external grade Cat5e UTP for that job.
Click to expand...

Live and learn about the rj45s, this was all I could buy at Screwfix today !

I have two runs of this cable around 7m exposed to elements, looks like I may have to re-lay the cabling then...
 
bremen1874 said:
10Mbps?

It's not unusual to find that cable runs at 100Mbps instead of Gigabit because of a bad crimp (100Mbps only requires two of the pairs, Gigabit needs all four).
Click to expand...

Yup! I’m thinking the cable may be faulty or damaged somewhere along the 15m run.

Any recommendations for national stores that sell decent external shielded Cat6?
 
bledd said:
Your cable tester, which type do you have? Did you check both ends of the tester?

Often the sender unit will ask light up. It's the receiver you want to look at.

Poorly crimped ends. Show a closer picture of them, cables may not be all the way in.

You want the jacket in the plug.
Click to expand...

The tester is a straight-forward short and mis-wire check. This is the exact one:



I don’t think it’s possible to produce photos any closer than what’s been provided! For reference, I’ve crimped every other cable in the house (around 40) and they’ve been fine for 1.5yrs.
 
the-evaluator said:
As daft as it sounds, try a different firmware on the new AP.

I had the exact same problem with an AC-Lite and after scratching my head for days and trying different switch ports, switches, cables and even using a known good PoE injector I downgraded the firmware. It connected fine, I then upgraded the firmware (so it went back to the firmware it arrived with) and it's been fine ever since through various firmware upgrades.

If you bring the new AP closer to an existing AP then the wireless uplink should be stable enough to let you change the firmware.
Click to expand...

I’ve just laid 40 floorboards so far today, I’m going to jump to this cable issue now.

I’m going to connect the AP directly to the switch using a 0.5m cable and see what happens there; it could well be an AP issue as you suggest but this will hopefully diagnose it a bit better.

I’ll then patch the new cable into the main switch and try the laptop on that, Incase the UniFi PoE switch is dialing back the speed for some reason.
 
I purchased a different cable tester and it indicated a fault in core 2. I recrimped both ends and it passed the tester.

I’ve disabled the nearest AP to the new AP and reattached it (forcing Ethernet adoption) and it adopted perfectly. Unfortunately it has once again dropped to ‘connected (wireless)’ - connected to the Landing AP with 12% signal strength(!).



So far, I’ve ruled out:

- AP fault
- Switch fault
- Crimp fault

That leaves interference from sky dish and cable and cable damage (15m through two external cavity walls).
 
bremen1874 said:
With some testers, you can only tell there's a problem by watching the light sequence at both ends.
Click to expand...

Ah OK. My existing one flagged an issue with core 2 until I recrimped with a new rj45 then it reported all ok. (It basically didn’t get a green light on the tester).
 
the-evaluator said:
The Sky dish shouldn't be a problem, I've got a run of cat 5e in the same trunking as the cable for my Sky dish and everything is working fine here.

Try and connect the new AP directly to the switch and see what happens. You could also disable wireless meshing completely and see if that helps, generally it's best to disable it if you don't need it as I find Ubiquiti stuff starts grumbling about STP when for some unknown reason it'll try and uplink wirelessly even though there's a working run of cat 5e in place.
Click to expand...

Disabled Mesh and the AP disconnects permanently.

I had already connected directly to switch no problem with the new AP, it has to be the cable.
 
bledd said:
Also, if you have CAT6 cable, use CAT6 RJ45 ends.

Although un-advised, should still work with incorrect plugs if crimped well.
Click to expand...

Funnily a Cat6 RJ45 keystone that I punched yesterday works fine in the same room (opposite end of room) and returns 1Gbps. I can’t get a cable from this to the AP location sadly.
 
bremen1874 said:
Do you have spare sockets you could attach to the problem cable? They'd take the plugs and crimp tool you're using out of the equation.
Click to expand...

I have a whole box of them, but the location is around 1ft from the ceiling so it wouldn't look too pretty having a polished chrome network point up there with a trailing cable to the AP!

Although a bit of Velcro could get around this issue if I mounted the AP directly over it.

Perhaps a moot point however, as I have some outdoor shielded Cat6 coming tomorrow morning ... with moulded rj45 attached. I’ll test the cable first before cutting one rj45 off, then route it and recrimp with a shielded Cat6 connector.
 
The plot thickens, twice over!

Cable/Core 2 is showing as no-signal on both sides of the cable using the new tester. I’ve recrimped them both 4 times now. I’ll try using the new Cat6 rj45s rut I’ve bought.


Strangely I’ve been sent 30m of cat7 outdoor and shielded. I tested this locally (no cutting ends off etc or touring through walls). This received PoE from the UniFi switch but did not communicate with it at all.

I restarted the full system and the 30m cable now allows full adoption of the new AP (and then downloaded the firmware!). So this is positive, a 30m cable length allows the AP to function.

Next step will involve me chopping the end off the cable. As it is cat7, I’m thinking that I’m going to have to replace both ends to Cat6? I don’t have any cat7 RJ45 connectors ...
 
I recrimped the existing cable with Cat6 rj45 connectors and the new tester reported fault on 1 and 4 at the AP end, and the switch end reported 2 as a fault.

I checked and double, and triple checked the crimps and every cable was perfectly in the contact sever areas but still no joy!

Next up, I’m going to get cat5e as suggested and hopefully that will make a difference. I think I’m going to need to get a telescopic ladder to get on the flat roof, the step ladders were... interesting :rolleyes:
 
bledd said:
Is there a tack in the cable or something?

Sounds like it's damaged.

Test the tester on a short cable to verify it..
Click to expand...

Maybe when knocking in the tacks I hit the cable and crushed a core? Certainly hit my thumb...

The tester was fine on the cat7 precrimped.
 
memyselfandi said:
Have you tried just grabbing a 2m premade patch cable from somewhere and just checking whether the AP works when just connected with that rather than in its final position? I.e. confirm that everything else works together properly before concentrating purely on the cable.
Click to expand...

Hi, yes with two different cables - cat7 and a Cat6 pre-made, in different switches too. The AP is fine, the issue is either the cable, rj45s, crimping tool or life hating me :D
 
I made a test cable using my new cat5e external cable, and it reported no signal on cores 1-3. This was using the original rj45 (cat5) connectors. My crimping is honestly not botched! I'm going to try using better RJ45s and report back...
 
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